King David the Psalmist is one of the key biblical personages in domestic poetical culture. Poets consider him as a teacher and a brilliant master of poetical harmony. The paper justifies the necessity to consider the Psalmist’s image when studying the Russian poetry. For the first time the researcher provides a detailed description of the Psalmist’s image, analyses the interpretations of this image in oral and written poetry of the XVII century. The findings lead to the conclusion that the Russian tradition of honouring the poet is continuation of the biblical tradition personified in the image of prophet David the Psalmist, one of Russia’s most worshipped saints.